CAPS Independent Advocacy, Musselburgh (2025)

25/09/2025

🌻💛Our advocacy workers work for you and no-one else. See our website to find out more about who our Independent Advocacy services are for and how to get in touch. 🗣An advocacy worker can help you get your voice heard. Independent Advocacy is free and confidential.

Dunfermline Advocacy AdvoCard Partners in Advocacy Ceartas Advocacy

[Image descriptions: 1 Our advocacy workers work with people living in Midlothian or East Lothian who have a mental health issue or use drugs or alcohol and people living in Midlothian, East Lothian or Edinburgh who identify as LGBTQIA+.

2 You can have someone by your side in meetings, for example appointments with your doctor, housing or education meetings and lots of other situations. Advocacy is free and confidential.

3 A grid of four squares each with a different symbol inside. One is a graphic of a doctor, one is a pound sign, one is a graphic of a house and one is of a teacher teaching students.]

18/09/2025

👥Join the Exhibition Team as a volunteer this October and November! Help during set up or as an Exhibition Invigilator.

Find out more here: https://www.outofsightoutofmind.scot/news/join-the-2025-exhibition-team

Or, find out more in person at the Volunteer Orientation Visit on Monday 29th September, 2-3:30pm Summerhall Meet organisers, see the exhibition spaces and ask questions about what’s involved over a cuppa. Let us know you are coming.

If you can’t come and are still interested to volunteer, then that’s ok, just get in touch…

Contact Louise, Exhibition Assistant.
Email: exhibitionassistant@capsadvocacy.org Mobile: 07971 951 519

ID: A planning group member, is seen from behind wearing a purple oosoom t-shirt welcoming and talking to people in the Summerhall entrance during the 2024 exhibition launch.

CAPS Independent Advocacy Summerhall Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival iThrive Edinburgh

17/09/2025

📢 The OOSOOM 2025 poster is here!
🎨 Each year, our poster is designed with care to reflect the spirit of the exhibition and the creativity of everyone involved.
Enjoy it, share it, visit the website to download and print your own. Keep an eye out for it across Edinburgh and online.

Download your own copy from the website: www.outofsightoutofmind.scot/news/oosoom-2025-poster-is-here

[ID: The OOSOOM 2025 poster, with the OOSOOM logo in pink centred over an abstract painting with a brown background and yellow, green brush strokes encircling pink and red brush strokes, with ‘Comfort and disturb’ handwritten in orange pen over the top. Below is written; ‘An exhibition of art made by with people experiences of mental health issues. 22 October - 8 November 2025, Wednesday - Sunday, 11am - 6pm, Summerhall, Free. The exhibition presents a wide variety of themes, some may be affecting, thought provoking, everyday and/or awesome. Followed by supporting organisation logos in black, including; Caps Independent Advocacy, iThrive Edinburgh, People’s Postcode Lottery Trust, Edinburgh Health and Social Care Partnership, Mental Health Foundation and Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival.]

CAPS Independent Advocacy Summerhall
Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival iThrive Edinburgh

16/09/2025

✊Power to the people! Human rights in our hands.

💛Attend the People’s Conference to understand and know your rights when it comes to mental health. Find out more about demystifying human rights, think about how rights can be applied through advocacy and how cuts to services can impact how our rights are realised.
The People’s Conference is a space of solidarity for people with mental health issues to support each other to explore whatever they feel is important. This year’s conference is all about human rights because we know that as people with mental health issues we may be vulnerable to discrimination and marginalisation and as a result our rights may not be respected.

📆 24 September
🕥 10:30am - 4:30pm
📍 Norton Park Edinburgh
👀Find out more and sign up here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/human-rights-in-our-hands-the-peoples-conference-2025-tickets-1610074800069?aff=oddtdtcreator

Human Rights Consortium Scotland Dunfermline Advocacy Norton Park Business and Conference Centre Change Mental Health

[Image description:‘Human rights in our hands

The People’s Conference 2025

The conference is for people with lived experience of a mental health issue living in Edinburgh and the Lothians. This year we will be talking about people's human rights.
Wednesday 24th September
10:30am to 4:30pm
Norton Park Conference Centre, Edinburgh
Booking is essential.

With a black and white image of hands holding a piece of scrunched up paper with the words ‘human rights’ written on it. And the Lothian Voices logo.]

11/09/2025

🎨🔥In this blog post find out how have rescued the Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition which will go ahead as planned this October! Get yourself down to Summerhall in October to see all the wonderful artworks!
https://capsadvocacy.org/news/peoples-postcode-trust-rescues-out-of-sight-out-of-mind-exhibition/

Out Of Sight Out Of Mind Exhibition People's Postcode Lottery

[Image descriptions: 1 A photograph of Lauren smiling towards the camera seated in the Scottish Parliament with the words “I'd spent months helping plan our exhibition whilst also creating my own artwork for it. I feared it had all been for nothing but then a glimmer of hope appeared.” (Lauren)”.

2 A photograph of people looking at artwork in the Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition with the words over the top: “CAPS is delighted to share the good news that thanks to players of People’s Postcode Lottery the Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition will go ahead as planned this October” and the People’s Postcode Lottery and People’s Postcode Trust logos.

3 A photograph of people looking at artwork in the Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition with the words ““It made me realise how many of us human beings have mental health challenges as part of us. It helped me feel more at home in the world.” (Audience member)”.

Photos in 2 and 3 by Chris Scott]

10/09/2025

Funding Update:

Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition will go ahead this October as planned.

We're sorry to share that in the process of savings being made by Edinburgh Health and Social Care Partnership we lost the option to continue Arts as Advocacy and Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition next year. We know this is hard news. We send solidarity to the similarly affected projects in Edinburgh, including the three other CAPS Collective Advocacy projects.

🧡 On behalf of everyone involved, thank you to all who have given their support, including the Collective Advocacy Response Group, the Planning Group, our partners, exhibitors and staff in lots of other organisations. Many wrote testimonials, and sent emails to councillors and MSPs. Many read and shared our updates, sent messages, likes and positive thoughts. We also thank the Edinburgh Integrated Joint Board members that voted in our favour. 🧡

Going forward, we will draw from this support, and we will search for funding.

We remain resilient. We resist mental health being out of sight and out of mind. We want people with mental health issues to have their own space to come together and be seen, heard and celebrated through their art.

The OOSOOM Exhibition Team are now focusing efforts on the 2025 exhibition. The biggest yet with 400 exhibitors, and we are proud to join the other events in the Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival programme. We can’t wait to see you at Summerhall this October and November!

CAPS funding update: https://capsadvocacy.org/news/funding-update/
More OOSOOM updates to follow: https://www.outofsightoutofmind.scot/

CAPS Independent Advocacy Summerhall Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival
iThrive Edinburgh

28/08/2025

We’re very sorry to announce that on Tuesday 26th August 2025 the Edinburgh Integration Joint Board (EIJB) voted to let contracts for four of our projects end on 30th November 2025. These contracts pay for: Arts as Advocacy work which includes the Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition; Collective Advocacy for people who identify as LGBTQIA+, Collective Advocacy for people from Minority Ethnic backgrounds and the work with peer workers known as the Peer Forum.

The EIJB voted on savings proposals recommended by Health and Social Care Partnership officials. Collective Advocacy participant, Lauren Stonebanks, and CAPS’ CEO, Jane Crawford, attended in person and made a deputation. There was a counter proposal which had the backing of two councillors and was asking for our projects to be considered as part of a recommissioning exercise rather than coming to an end on 30th November. Unfortunately the EIJB voted for the original proposal to let their funding for these projects end.

CAPS Management Committee will consider the situation and more information about the work of these projects will be communicated when it is available.

A group of Collective Advocacy participants, called the Response Group, worked incredibly hard to challenge the Health and Social Care Partnership’s cuts and CAPS would like to thank them and all group members, and organisations, who have written testimonials in support of these projects and contacted councillors and MSPs asking for their support. We also thank the councillors on the EIJB who voted in our favour for their support.

[Image description: 'Update on funding decision and thank you for your support']

19/08/2025

📢🗣Calling all military veterans! CAPS Independent Advocacy is a partner in Scotland’s Veterans Wellbeing Alliance. Our role, as an Independent Advocacy provider is to ensure that the voices of as many veterans as possible are heard and amplified in the design and delivery of the work of the Alliance. The event will be facilitated by Steven, a veteran himself and Collective Advocacy worker for CAPS Independent Advocacy.

Find out more and book here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/veterans-working-together-tickets-1517407640099?aff=oddtdtcreator

Community Veterans Support Lothians Veterans Centre Vector24 Your AFBC Poppyscotland Legion Scotland

[Image description:
Veterans Working
Together
Thursday 28th August
Community Veterans Support, The Pearce Institute, 840-860 Govan Road, G51 3UU, 1.30pm to 4.30pm or hybrid online

Gather together with other veterans and find common ground by discussing what you need from veterans’ services. Join us for an afternoon focused on your experiences as a veteran and the services you might use.

• What is it like to be a veteran living in Scotland?
• Do you know what services are out there for veterans, and what they all do?
• Is it easy to navigate these services?
• What’s missing?

Contact:
steven@capsadvocacy.org
text: 07929751911

Logos of CAPS Independent Advocacy and Scotland’s Veterans Wellbeing Alliance.]

15/08/2025

💛The People’s Conference is one of the highlights of the year for mental health lived experience! Here’s the Lothian Voices group, who create the conference, with their poster hot off the press!

If you’ve got experience of mental health issues, come along to meet like-minded folk, have a nice lunch and talk about how things can be better for people with mental health issues. This year the group have chosen to focus on human rights, an especially important topic as we see human rights under threat, particularly for marginalised people.
The conference is on 24 September at Norton Park in Edinburgh, it’s free to attend. Find out how to register here: https://capsadvocacy.org/events/the-peoples-conference-2025/

iThrive Edinburgh eastspace.org.uk - East Lothian's Mental Health Information Website West Space .co.uk - Midlothian's Mental Health Information Website

[Image description: a group of seven people seated around a table smiling, holding up a colourful poster advertising the People’s Conference - Human Rights: in our hands.]

13/08/2025

⚖📢For people from Minority Ethnic or LGBTQIA+ communities in Edinburgh, mental health can be worsened by the stigma and the lack of understanding, of experiences and the social and political context in which these groups exist, that they can experience in the mental health system. Currently in the UK, both these communities are experiencing rising harms and threats to their rights. But the EIJB may soon vote to withdraw funding for Collective Advocacy for these very groups when they need it most. In July, members of CAPS’ Collective Advocacy groups wrote an open letter to the EIJB, the body responsible for decisions on this funding, to protest proposed cuts.

We have now received the final recommendations to be put before the EIJB on 26th August. The EIJB will vote on whether to withdraw funding for four of CAPS’ projects: the Out of Sight Out of Mind exhibition; Collective Advocacy for people who identify as LGBTQIA+ and Collective Advocacy for Minority Ethnic people and the Peer Forum. The other projects will be put into a recommissioning exercise. You can read the full update on the EIJB’s vote here: https://capsadvocacy.org/news/update-on-collective-advocacy-funding/

Please share to help make more people aware of this situation 💛

Voices Of eXperience (VOX) Change Mental Health Scottish Mental Health Arts Festival

[Image descriptions: photographs of the open letter written to the EIJB by CAPS’ groups in front of Edinburgh landmarks: the Scottish Parliament, the City Chambers, City of Edinburgh Council offices, Calton Hill and Arthur’s seat.]

07/08/2025

👀Exploring and exposing Mad History is a powerful tool for reclaiming and projecting the voices and experiences of so many who have been silenced and stigmatised in society. This short community course based at the University of Edinburgh will do just that. For people with experience of mental health issues, this is an opportunity to meet others in a relaxed atmosphere to understand Mad History. You’ll work with unique collections in the Lothian Health Services Archives spanning hundreds of years.
The course begins on Thursday 28th August with following sessions on Tuesdays 2nd, 9th and 16th of September. It is free to attend. Register here: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/understanding-oor-mad-history-tickets-1477977613829?aff=oddtdtcreator

Lothian Health Services Archive

[Image description: A number of items from the Oor Mad History archive at CAPS. 1. A hand written poster for an exhibition by the Lothian Users Forum called ‘A sanity clause’ in Edinburgh. 2. The cover of a report called ‘Silence of the lads’ from the first mental health survey of black and minority ethnic men in Scotland. 3. A poster giving instructions on how to give ‘emotional CPR’]

04/08/2025

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